#uss guadalcanal

[littlewestern]

Guadalcanal trying to make conversation with U505 like the old country buffet guy is so beautiful to imagine

Okay so I had to google this but I found the tiktoks and I'm losing it lol.

DJ:

"Have you tried the lasagna?" "Klassifiziert."

Guadalcanal (occasionally referred to here by his nickname, "Can Do") is actually in somewhat of a breach of protocol with these questions, since he's really not supposed to be interacting with U-505 unless necessary. He's just supposed to be hauling him around. But Can Do is... also a little bit spoiled. Being part of a special task group and beloved by both captain and crew will let you get away with trying to engage the captured enemy submarine in conversation that is not strictly intelligence-related.

Can Do shrugs it off easily by saying that establishing a rapport with the prisoner might be a good way of putting him at ease and thus extracting information, but not everyone feels this way. Some little boats think this is actually interfering with their jobs. Flaherty, Jenks, and Pope in particular feel that someone should probably say something, but they're in a difficult position in that regard. Can Do technically outranks them, and the destroyers are a bit of a divided front since Chatelain is also trying to get the U-boat's attention, and Pillsbury refuses to take a side, since she dislikes when there's discord amongst the task group.

Too, this behavior is hard to moderate since capturing the submarine in and of itself constitutes something of an extenuating circumstance. No enemy vessel has been boarded this way since 1812, and no one's exactly sure what rules they're operating under, so there's nothing to point to to back up their arguments that Can Do should really just focus on doing his job so they can do theirs. Can Do is a big ship that is used to getting his way, and his winning smile and cavalier attitude towards which rules should and should not apply to him make dealing with him difficult sometimes. The submarine is finding this out firsthand.

[carbone14]

Le croiseur lourd USS Minneapolis (CA-36) suite à une torpille reçue à la proue du navire la nuit précédente lors de la bataille navale de Tassafaronga – Campagne de Guadalcanal – Campagne des îles Salomon – Guerre du Pacifique – Tulagi – Iles Salomon – 1er décembre 1942

Photographe : Official U.S. Navy Photograph

©Naval History and Heritage Command - 80-G-211215

[lonestarbattleship]

"USS ENTERPRISE (CV-6) seen from another U.S. ship while under attack by Japanese dive bombers during the Battle of the Eastern Solomons on August 24, 1942. An intense fire is burning in her starboard after five-inch gun gallery, the result of a bomb hit that ignited ready-service ammunition.

Note the anti-aircraft shell bursts over the carrier."

U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command: NH 97778

[greatwesternway]

What kind of personalities do the destroyers have? We already know Pope is emo…

Been busy preparing for the movers to come so I hope you don't mind if I just dug up some chatlogs rather than write an essay. A lot of this is involves the non-canon event in which the capturing party attends U-505's dedication ceremony in 1954, but the point is the interpersonal stuff is still true whether the events illustrating them happen or not.

Ray: Yeah all the little ships were destroyer escorts, no specialty skills among them. Although Pillsbury was later refitted into a radar picket and used to detect incoming enemy aircraft in the Pacific theatre of the war. Pope continued to serve with Guadalcanal and actually sunk another U-boat before the war ended.

During the U-505 hunt, Flaherty screened for Guadalcanal which meant she was a defensive presence rather than an offensive one.

DJ: Maybe she's the one who knows German and is wary of getting too sympathetic to U-505 and Jenks (as one of the two ships tasked with rescuing survivors) just agrees with her.

---

DJ: Maybe Jenks is still the one who's like, "okay, you need to leave that submarine alone" about it. Flaherty isn't comfortable being called over so often to translate, but she doesn't push back on it because she doesn't want to let on that she worries she could be compromised this way. She's acting in a purely defensive capacity on this mission; she should be defensive! Jenks already is sympathizing with U-505 on how weird Guadalcanal is making it and that's quite close enough for his liking. But Guadalcanal does not explain what he's looking for with his questions and statements to either of them because they are both still destroyer escorts. Doesn't think they'll get the value in his approach since they're always so worried about him.

Ray: Aw! Jenks looking out for Flaherty too.

DJ: He is but he's also not making it about that 'cause, you know, they're war machines. Doesn't want to undermine her by making it about her concerns. Especially since he's got the same ones. Instead makes it about Guadalcanal's behavior being questionable. And ironically that treating U-505 this kindly is actually more demeaning than treating him like the POW he is.

Ray: Guadalcanal like "Why does no one here trust me to do my job?" 

Can Do is doing the Gallery thing like, "This hasn't happened in over 100 years! A little breach in protocol isn't just to be expected, it's practically required! But he doesn't have to explain that to them because they're but wee.

Like he's taking the long view, it's about the submarine but it's also what's going to happen to the submarine in future, and if they're all on the same page about it no one has to go to the bottom of the ocean before time.

DJ: It's hard to look at the long view when you're a war machine. You might only have today! Flaherty is also the only one besides Guadalcanal who understands that being preserved at the MSI is not a reward.

Ray: Yes. Pope probably does too but I feel like he is staying the hell away from all'a this discourse. It's Jenks and Chatelain and maybe Pillsbury if they can talk her into siding with them, but she hardly counts because she's not going to even approach questioning his authority. She's like, "I feel like he's just doing what he thinks is best!" and doesn't know what that is. She would like it if everyone would stop worrying about what everyone else is doing. This is plane behavior, and she would know.

---

Ray: Chatelain wants to do makeover night and Pillsbury and Flaherty are like "no ❤️"

DJ: Chatelain desperately wishes they'd permit red lipstick on the uniform.

Ray: She would look so good in it, but alas it is not regulation and Guadalcanal will reprimand her for it.

DJ: He lets her get away with a little eyeliner. Men can't tell when women are wearing makeup unless its red lipstick anyway. As long as it's not egregious, he lets these little boats get away with a lot. It's their own fault if so many of them are so by-the-book.

Ray: Yeah, he's a softie <3 He likes his little boats, best escort he's had.

---

Guadalcanal: Is that hair ribbon regulation? 🤔

Flaherty: No. 😌

Guadalcanal: Right, carry on.

---

DJ: At the MSI, U-505 speaks to Flaherty specifically. They ask her what he says. "He says he would like to thank you, Guadalcanal, for your kindness and hospitality during his capture." And Guadalcanal starts gettin' an "What'd I tell you?" face about it so U-505 says something more, that actually makes Flaherty almost laugh. "And he wishes to thank the rest of us for trying to stop you." Everybody laughs and Guadalcanal rather regrets that U-505 doesn't speak English because it sounds like he might be funny.

Ray: God, they're so cute.

DJ: Flaherty thinking she was absolutely right to be concerned about being too friendly with him. But now it's 1954 so it doesn't matter if they laugh about it.

Ray: Flaherty knows that he's entirely too charming by half. She's glad to be the one doing the translating actually, because it means she can control (to a degree) what Guadalcanal hears. It didn't help but y'know.

DJ: Like a redaction office blacking out his mail. Most of U-505's sarcastic little barbs didn't make it to Guadalcanal in their original state because she knew he'd just be encouraged and more intent if he thought U-505 was playing with them. He wasn't very charming at the time, but much as she (and Jenks) hate to agree with an enemy, she thought he was right to be standoffish. Would have preferred that she could too.

Ray: Aw, I just thought about Pillsbury being there and playing with the planes.

DJ: Oh! Yeah, the little planes probably like Pillsbury a lot. You can play rough with her.

Ray: Yeah! And she's very complimentary of Spitfire because she doesn't have a lot of experience with British planes. She thinks he's very cute (and he is!).

DJ: She's nice and solid too, not like Jenny and Texaco. You can barrel right into her and bounce right off.

Ray: Stuka likes her well enough until she elbow drops him and he pops back up with little hearts circling around his head. "I didn't forget about you ❤️ bonk" and she says it with the sweetest look on her face. It's easy to underestimate her because she looks kind of dopey but she knocks them both down like it's nothing. And she knows plane stuff! Very exciting visit for them.

DJ: Yeah, Stuka's already excited because this big U-boat is here and he thinks he's gonna have a new friend (which is not really how it goes, but) and a bunch of boats came to see this guy too and this one is really fun and wants to play with them AND she can play with them. Good day for the little warplanes!

Ray: All the Task Group members keep jokingly asking if the MSI is accepting any more boats.

DJ: lol, I wonder if they have the boat exhibit by then. I think they might have. But they are all too big. Those are model boats.

Ray: And the boats don't actually want to be preserved anyway, but it's a cute jab at the ones that seem to be having a lot of fun here. I think most of them probably did not know what to expect. But coming here… it's nice! Not too nice, because the submarine doesn't deserve that, but it's nicer than they expected.

God, I wish 727 were there. She'd love this.

DJ: They don't really care about whether his conditions are too good for him or not. It's more just that if anyone is going to be set up as a monument to lost American seamen, it should probably be one of them and not a boat that was responsible for some of those lost seamen. If any of them had been offered the job, they'd be happy to take it. It's more service.

But Guadalcanal and Flaherty are the ones that have to point out that the job would only be like that for them, since they won. For U-505, he's being made a permanent trophy. When you recognize that, he's taking it like a real champ. Being very gracious about it, especially since he thought he was this 🤏close to finally being dismissed.

Ray: Guadalcanal gets to point out that any boat that served in the war could be a monument to the lost seamen, but the fact that it's an enemy ship is a testament to their specific prowess. It's a flex, one they got to play a part in. That his exhibit will bear their names for all time is its own kind of preservation.

DJ: Yeah, if it's basically a thing of, if you're indignant that U-505's getting put up at a museum and not one of us, know that he's probably not that happy about it either no matter how well he seems to be taking to it (and I mean, if anyone has practice being a gracious loser, it's U-505). And he's gonna spend the rest of forever being a gracious loser so if you're still holding onto old wartime feelings about it, you can go to the scrapyard knowing that. Covers everyone's various feelings and shuts them up about it.

[markloveshistory]

Admiral Willis A “Ching” Lee

[alex99achapterthree]

WWII history...

On the hangar deck of USS Lexington (CV2) near Hawaii in 1941, before the start of WWII.

Douglas SBD Dauntless (nearest) & TBD Devastators from USN Scouting Sqn. No.2.

The Devastators were obsolete when the war began. They acquitted themselves well enough in the early months of 1942 but were savagely mauled at Midway, and remaining examples were withdrawn from service.

The Dauntless, nicknamed "slow but deadly", served with distinction in the early war years, especially at Midway and Guadalcanal. The Battle of the Philippine Sea in 1944 was the last major engagement for the SBD before being replaced by the Curtiss SB2C Helldiver.

Note the spare airframes stored in the overhead.

[victusinveritas]

German Submarine U-505 off the coast of Africa being boarded by members of the escort carrier USS Guadalcanal.

The submarine was turned over to the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry.

[judgemark45]

A U.S. Navy Douglas SBD-3 Dauntless flies over the aircraft carriers USS Enterprise (CV-6), foreground, and USS Saratoga (CV-3) near Guadalcanal on 19 December 1942. The aircraft is likely on anti-submarine patrol. Saratoga is trailed by her plane guard destroyer. Another flight of three aircraft is visible near the Saratoga. The radar array on the Enterprise has been obscured by a wartime censor.

Both carriers had been badly damaged off Guadalcanal the previous August but had been patched up at Pearl Harbor and sent back on duty as the only USN fleet carriers left in the Pacific.

[captain-price-unofficially]

USS San Francisco passes underneath a fog-covered Golden Gate Bridge as she returns for repairs from the Battle of Guadalcanal. December 1942

[usafphantom2]

2nd September 1937. First flight of the Grumman XF4F fighter, which would become known as the Wildcat. Its performance was initially inferior to the rival Brewster Buffalo, and the aircraft required an extensive redesign before being put into production. Despite this unpromising beginning, the Wildcat would prove crucial in the early stages of the Pacific war. Though less manoeuvrable than the Japanese Zero, it was well armed, rugged and a capable adversary in the hands of a skilled pilot.

The Wildcat’s first combat sorties were actually flown by the Royal Navy’s Fleet Air Arm. Named Martlet in British use until 1944, the type’s first victory was a Junkers 88 over Scapa Flow on Christmas Day 1940. Martlets went on to serve successfully on the first Royal Navy escort carrier, HMS Audacity, in 1941. They continued in this role until the end of the war, scoring their final victories in Fleet Air Arm service by shooting down four Bf 109s in March 1945.

Wildcats first flew in combat against the Japanese during the attempt to take Wake Island in early December 1941. Four Marine F4Fs mounted a heroic defence, breaking up several air attacks as well as sinking a destroyer and submarine with 100lb bombs before the island finally fell on 23rd December. Wildcats served in all the key early engagements of the Pacific war, including Coral Sea, Midway and the defence of Guadalcanal.

Wildcats quickly established a reputation for toughness, able to absorb far more punishment than their Japanese opponents, and had an impressive kill/loss ratio. Wildcats were credited with destroying over 1,000 Japanese aircraft for 178 aerial losses, 24 to anti-aircraft fire, and 49 to operational causes. One Navy and seven Marine Corps pilots would earn the Medal of Honor in Wildcats.

In early 1943, Wildcat production was taken over by General Motors under the designation FM-1 and later the improved FM-2. Though replaced by the more powerful Hellcat on American fleet carriers during that year, the Wildcat’s small size and light weight made it ideal for use on escort and light carriers. With the addition of folding wings, they were well suited to the limited hangar and deck space available.

As in Royal Naval service, they remained in use until the end of the war. For example, during the battle of Leyte Gulf in October 1944, Wildcats mounted strafing runs against Japanese warships, helping to buy time for their parent escort carriers to escape.

Pictured:

1) First prototype Grumman XF4F-2 in flight. Note the cowling machine guns, forward radio antenna mast and telescopic gunsight, none of which featured on production models.

📷 thisdayinaviation.com

2) Grumman Martlet of 888 Squadron NAS warming up on board HMS Formidable prior to takeoff.

📷 IWM (A 11640)

3) Wrecked Grumman F4F-3 Wildcat fighters of Marine Fighting Squadron 211 (VMF-211), photographed by by the Wake airstrip sometime after the Japanese captured the island on 23rd December 1941. The plane in the foreground, 211-F-11, was flown by Captain Henry T. Elrod during the 11th December attacks that sank the Japanese destroyer Kisaragi. Damaged beyond repair at that time, 211-F-11 was subsequently used as a source of parts to keep other planes operational. Elrod received a posthumous Medal of Honor after leading a beach defence unit during the final Japanese assault.

📷 NHHC 80-G-179006

4) FM-2 Wildcat over the escort carrier USS Santee during the Leyte landings on 20th October. Santee would survive a kamikaze attack and a torpedo hit from a Japanese submarine 5 days later.

📷 NHHC 80-G-287594

@JamieMctrusty via X

[lonestarflight]

"The Apollo 9 spacecraft, with astronauts James A. McDivitt, David R. Scott, and Russell L. Schweickart aboard, approaches touchdown in the Atlantic recovery area to conclude a successful 10-day Earth-orbital space mission. Splashdown was at 12:00:53 p.m. EST, March 13, 1969, only 4.5 nautical miles from the prime recovery ship, USS GUADALCANAL (LPH-7)."

Date: March 13, 1969

NASA ID: link, S69-27465

[littlewestern]

Guadalcanal looks a little like the 1940s-era superhero Sparky Watts, as created by Boody Rogers. Idk if this was intentional or not but they seem to have a similar "can-do" personality bordering on the absurd in different ways

I'd never heard of this character! But it's the right time period so I was excited to look him up.

...My god, it's uncanny.

There's a few things going on here, and it's a fun opportunity to talk about the design process, which I'm always happy to explore.

So when I first started working on Guadalcanal, I was immediately drawn to the little detail that he had one gun for defense purposes. It's almost silly, right? This big, imposing aircraft carrier who can't really defend himself at all and has to rely on the destroyer escort, but still carries around a tiny ladypistol "just in case". For that reason, my primary visual inspiration is, no joke:

Doctor The Meme himself from Gundam X. The wiki tells me his name is 'Techcs Farzenberg' which is an absolutely top-tier white-people-in-anime name.

Gonna be honest, I'm mad I didn't look up more pics of this guy before. Now This Is Fucking Character Design.

But he's a little old, right? And that hair just won't do. And I like how serious the glasses make him look, but I need a little more charm. A big boat needs to be the kind of character little boats will want to follow and defend. So we have a basic idea (as silly as it is) but we need to fill out the details.

I'm big on drawing design inspiration from old photos. Not only is this a great way to draw period-accurate outfits, but it also helps with designing more realistic faces. I find that when I draw inspiration from photos and real people, my characters feel more realistic, like people you could actually meet somewhere instead of just lines on a page. So I googled up "wwii navy men stock images" and clicked around.

Oh yeah, this is great stuff. His glasses dovetail nicely with our bespectacled non-combatant idea, and this lad's hair is much more indicative of the time period we're trying to portray. From this guy I pulled the hairstyle and reaffirmed that my decision to give Guadalcanal glasses was the right one. This guy just looks so approachable, and I want that for my character as well. If this is your great-grandpa, congrats, he lives in my head rent-free.

Now to put the finishing touches on him. I bulked him up a lot to give that air of importance and authority, and softened his facial features out to make him even more friendly-looking. His face - particularly his nose and mouth - are heavily inspired by an ex-boyfriend of mine (who I won't show here for obvious reasons lol). I think most designers can't help but draw inspiration from the people around them, so we might as well lean into it. I love the way my lived experiences can be reflected in my work. Now we can put it all together!

The one on the left was the first-pass design and the one on the right was a redraw after some tweaks and a bit of practice. You can tell I struggled with the hair and just phoned it in, but that's what first-passes are for. There's a reason I never posted the first design, lol. The second one I prettied him up a bit and broadened all of his features, focusing on his nose and the ratio of negative space around his eyes and mouth. I think this gives him a more mature look without aging him too much, since we still want him to look young enough to excuse his youthful arrogance. I figured out the hair as well, which was helpful!

"But why does he look so much like Sparky, then?" You might ask. This is a fun example of 'convergent evolution' - where two artists come up with the same result based on different approaches! A thing that's important to note about Sparky is that he was originally designed as a send-up or parody of superhero comics of the time. This informs a lot of decisions about his design.

Sparky has superhuman strength, speed, and toughness. Sound familiar?

But of course, you don't want to step on a copyright holder's toes. And you want comic book buyers to know they're buying a Sparky Watts comic and not a Superman one. Being a parody gives the artist a lot of outs here, ways to make Sparky visually distinct while still poking fun at the types of superheroes the audience is more familiar with.

Where Superman sheds his Clark Kent glasses that make him unassuming and approachable, Sparky keeps them on all the time. Superman has tousled black hair and a costume with his symbol on the front, where Sparky has neatly-parted blonde hair and a normal collegiate outfit that distinguishes him only by way of saying that he's completely ordinary. You can see, then, how they arrived at his design. By making him *different from Superman* they made him the same as Guadalcanal. That's okay, they didn't know. ;^)

Thanks for the ask!

[carbone14]

Des avions japonais ciblent le porte-avions USS Enterprise (CV-6) – Bataille des îles Santa cruz – Campagne de Guadalcanal – Campagne des îles Salomon – Guerre du Pacifique – 26 octobre 1942

©Naval History and Heritage Command – 80-G-20989

L'USS Enterprise (CV-6) est à gauche, avec au moins deux avions ennemis visibles au-dessus. A droite le cuirassé USS South Dakota (BB-57) tire une salve de sa batterie tribord comme l'indique le flash lumineux au centre du navire.

[lonestarbattleship]

"A near miss creates a geyser of watter whitch towers over USS ENTERPRISE (CV-6) during the Battle of the Eastern Solomons, on August 24, 1942. The Japanese Aichi D3A1 Val dive-bomber and its bomb crashed and exploded about 10 m from the ship's starboard side."

source

[greatwesternway]

What would the first Guadalcanal and Guadalcanal II think of one another if they met?

Guadalcanal the Second (LPH-7) would find Guadalcanal the First's (CVE-60) wartime behavior to be questionable, but would (in a condescending way) excuse it for his being an aircraft carrier. One cannot help being soft if they're just a support unit after all.

Can Do would find his successor to be worryingly cocky (as opposed to his own disposition which sits closer to smug), but it would be hard to argue that the Golden Guad hadn't lived up to the name. It is a very specific notoriety (and indicative of their particular shared character), being the only two ships in the U.S. Navy to capture enemy vessels this century.

In a continuity where the second Guadalcanal takes to visiting U-505 at the MSI and somehow the first Guadalcanal had way to have an opinion about it, he'd appreciate the follow up. He very much regretted that U-505 was put up as a monument rather than being destroyed as he surely would have preferred. Much as U-505 belonged to Guadalcanal though, Guadalcanal belonged Captain Gallery and Captain Gallery belonged to the U.S. Navy. Whatever either of them would have wanted, they were both beholden to powers greater than their own.

He'd also find it terribly amusing that U-505 maintains a pretense of treating he and his namesake as one and the same. U-505's obligation to prize rules ended when the first Guadalcanal was scrapped. The second Guadalcanal is very obviously not the same ship and so he has no claim. U-505 doesn't have to acknowledge him at all. That he does is because it's nice to have a shiny new warship (who actually behaves like one) come to visit you. Still, it's an utterly laughable circumstance when Germans are supposed to be so straightforward. Can Do would be miffed that U-505 liked the new Guadalcanal enough to do all this if it weren't so ridiculous.

And, you know, if you feel guilty about how capturing this guy led to his being placed in indefinite service to his enemies, then it's nice to know that the new you is, in a small part, making it up to him.

[monstroso]

got pinged by @siderods for an ask game, thanks for the tag!

gonna keep it short for yall tonight

nine things / nine people (nine doors?)

Last Song: I Am A Man Of Constant Sorrow. DJ and I were going to watch O Brother, Where Art Thou? but she keeps blowing me off so i have to listen to the soundtrack at work by myself. sad!

Favorite Color: to wear? black. in general? green.

Last Movie/TV Show: last thing I watched was VH1's 2008 documentary series on the sexual revolution. It was pretty interesting as a cultural artifact, a great snapshot in time and pretty informative too! it's called Sex: The Revolution, check it out if you can find it!

Sweet/Savory/Spicy: Savory most of the time, but I am a slut for all three.

Last Thing I Googled: "changes on tumblr" needed to see if the activity feed eating reblog notifs was on their to-fix list. it was not!

Current Obsession: ugh. The USS Guadalcanal CVE-60. don't look at me, i like boats now.

Last Book: Illinois Railway Museum In Color by Aaron Isaacs, a photohistory of my local railway museum.

Last Fic: A Patient's Guide To Living With ICS (House MD fic). I'm gonna be honest I only clicked on this one because it's set in Chicago. The dialogue was really good though, and the smut wasn't bad either!

Looking Forward To: getting my fuuuuucking car fixed tomorrow. oh and my friend @calliclassic is working on a commission for me that's almost done!

i tag: @the-commonplace-book @galushanationalrailways @stukagoggles @theskoomacat aaaand anyone else who wants to do this i feel shy about tagging anyone else lol